


On the Off Side of the Interstate

by EucratesBrice



Series: So it goes!verse [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Human, Case Fic, F/M, Gen, M/M, Sam Ships It, Supernatural Elements, Swearing, Tentative Destiel, alternate universe sheriff, alternate universe- smalltown, clut fic, gritty midwestern but not really, new type of case, tentative relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 05:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8566201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EucratesBrice/pseuds/EucratesBrice
Summary: On one extremely dull morning in spring, the mayor of petite little Willow Valley calls the precinct that his daughter- his very much adult daughter- is missing- no, not runaway, missing. When finding the mayor's daughter becomes a priority one case, and Sheriff Winchester is thrown into the deep end, what starts out as a dull case of find waldo complete with overbearing parents turns into a web of crime circles and cults.Dead bodies float up on the lake, women lay mauled in their own backyards and cars are burnt to ash by acid. But among all this, Sheriff Dean Winchester finds himself along side the missing girl's elusive, strange and far too complex brother on more occasions than he can count.The town Dean knew all his life hides secrets between it's very folds, the mayor he knew and learned to respect hides twists and turns at every corner, and Dean's best friend seems to be hiding a body or two but for reasons unknown, Dean seems to trust the lanky boy he barely knows a whole lot more that he should.Dark shadows lurk, mysterious surface and the two misfit team decide to join forces.and thus it goes.





	

01) The Gritty mid-western life

 _It happened on a particularly idle Tuesday in the middle of spring_.

Although everyone knew better than to believe him, he thoroughly believed that he took his pills with whiskey because he was crawling desperately after death and sweet surrender. He contemplated this while standing in front of his bathroom mirror that hid the medicine cabinet- the ones you found in every cheap low budget horror movie- as he chugged down the prescription pills with an unhealthy dose of Jack Daniels. This method worked well enough for a handful of people he knew, although for some reason, not on him. It seemed as though Death was vehemently avoiding him, like a high school teenager who'd gotten recently dumped and didn't trust themselves enough to be around that other person. He felt as though he'd one day accidentally dumped Death and therefore screwed up the beautiful relationship they could have had.  
That said, he really wasn't as dark and depressing as he tended to sound on Tuesday mornings.  
The lone toothbrush on the sink stared back at him almost mockingly and with a quiet fuck it he snatched it out of its cup holder. He wasn't really angry at the toothbrush, rather at what the toothbrush implied- which sure, at face level was hygiene but in a deeper sense, the toothbrush was a symbol of so much more than just hygiene, it also meant coming to terms with what he had to be hygienic for: which was work.  
All in all, the short way about it was that he was dreading work.  
Work- that was once full of life and adventure but had somewhere down the line digressed into a blur of faces and paper, shitty black coffee and stale bread. A swig of Daniels later, the tap was spewing out water with unhealthy chokes in bursts of steam. There was never adventure; the reality of it was that there was never adventure- once upon a god dam long time ago there was a persistent hero complex, but never any actual adventure. The most they had for adventure was when Mr Burgundy’s car crashed into a light pole due to some high strung, stoned teenagers loitering around the curb in front of his two story cul-de-sac completed with a picket fence. Everything here was completed with a picket fence. A clean white picket fence to match every clean white slate that roamed the streets, taunting him slowly with their glittering eyes and every memory they held behind it. All he wanted was a little dash of commotion, enough to set the boat rocking up not to capsize it. He didn’t crave danger, he found thrill in the pulse of the adrenaline flow.  
That said; he really wasn't as sadistic as he tended to sound on idle Tuesday mornings such as this one.  
Coming to terms with the fact that your dream job isn't all as what it looked like tended to take a toll on your personality, so he came off as a little sadistically excited for trouble, in reality he was just a little bit disappointed.  
The phone rang-a monstrosity hooked up on the wall which his brother gifted to him in mockery, although he ended actually using it- and its insistent cry of answer me in its shrill descent tone reverberated throughout the house. With a heavy sigh, he dragged his body out of the bathroom and into the living room that was littered, couch to countertop, with last week.  
"What?"  
"Dean Winchester?"  
"You 'ow is me," he mumbled in reply. "'Ooh's this?"  
"Sir, we need you down at the precinct."  
Dean pulled the toothbrush out of his mouth and heaved a sigh, "It's still six o clock, what could have possibly happened? Another raccoon has become roadkill? Another Coyote allegedly in Mrs. Peter's backyard?"  
"Sir. It's about the mayor's daughter." A pause. "She's missing."  
The phone cluttered to the ground, and shirt and jacket were hastily pulled on, badge thrown on and gun and belt holster haphazardly- the car screeched out of the drive way fast enough to break the sound barrier. And in the silence left in the house, the voice on the phone timidly called out,  
"Dean? Sir? Sir? Oh....okay. bye?"

 

There was distinct difference between _staying alive_ , and _living,_ and Jo Harvelle vehemently felt like she was only good at one of them. Good was an overstatement. It was the middle of spring, on a lazy almost average Tuesday at 5:20 am when Joanna was rudely disturbed by one frantic, confused Precinct Secretary or whatever her title was. In other words, mid-way through suffering her mother's allnighter spring cleaners, Joanna was interrupted by a panicking Becky Rosen and nearly an hour later, Jo still didn’t know whether to count this whole ordeal as a blessing or a curse. On one hand, she managed to neatly slip out of cleaning the larder, but on the other hand, she had to endure listening to the Mayor fret and rant about his missing daughter. Jo dragged her gaze from the paling Mayor to where her partner in not-crime was looking over the old man's shoulder with a smug grin as she 'swept the area' which entailed picking up expensive vases and exotic pieces of furniture, assessing them with a mixture of amusement and confusion then placing them back down. The distant sound of a car revering out in front of the porch broke the reverie Jo had let herself slip into.  
"That must be the Sheriff," she declared, in means of stopping the seemingly never-ending ballad the Mayor was spouting.  
The Mayor looked up at her with swollen, red eyes, and dabbed his cheeks with a stark white handkerchief before nodding in the form of granting permission as though permission was needed. Nevertheless, Jo graced him with a right amount of sympathetic slash right amount of lopsided grin before striding over to the door to let the Sheriff in. Her partner glanced up from the Japanese Feng Shui pot vase contraption for a moment, long enough to see the Sheriff march in sporting a steel glare in his eyes and yesterday's scruff. Deciding the pot-vase enigma of a household object was far more exciting, she looked back down and the pale blue ceramic pot-vase cradled in her arms.  
"Morning Sheriff," Jo smiled.  
The Sheriff nodded in acknowledgment before bee-lining towards where the Mayor sat on a pale yellow couch meant for three. The thing was hideous, and clearly chosen by someone other than the Mayor's wife for it stood out like a sore thumb against the rest of the room which was perfectly designed in a minimalistic nature.  
"Mayor, I am so sorry about this. Please don't worry, we'll find as soon as we can, I promise."  
"Oh, I don't doubt it Sheriff, I just-" The Mayor began before crumbling down into a mess of tears and hiccups.  
It was his first sentence that actually had substance, so Jo took this as a victory.  
"Can you please tell me everything you know?" The Sheriff smiled tightly, and then looked up at Jo from where he was seated beside the Mayor.  
The cue to started flipping notebook pages was given, so her partner made her way from the pot inventory to the couch to stand beside Jo and together they braced themselves for the Sheriff's reaction. If it was going to be anything like theirs had been, it wasn't going to be all too pleasant.  
"Well Anna Shirley went missing at around 6:00 pm last night and hasn't returned since. The Mayor and his wife assumed she would be at her friend's, Rowena Clearwater's house but they were informed by Rowena's mother as well as Rowena that Anna had not sighted her friend's house nor had Rowena seen the girl for a good two days. There's some disturbed area in the backyard and what looks like a path to the forest has been taken, leaving us to assume she took that path. There are no witnesses and no leads," Jo recited, flipping the page of her notepad simply to make use of her idle hands.  
"Bull. There's a lead and you know it, get someone on at this Rowena's house. Maybe Ash. Get a team on the woods as well-"  
"Sir," Hanscum began.  
"-Maybe we can follow this path she's left. Someone's bound to have seen her go. It was six o clock, not exactly pitch black-"  
"Sir," her partner tried again.  
"And if we can get Rowena down to the station maybe? Two days with no contact? Find out who Anna last contacted-"  
"Dean!" Jo snapped, "This is Anna Shirley we're talking about. Anna Shirley? Long red hair and the weird carryon bag Anna Shirley? There's absolutely nothing we can do."  
"What do you mean there's nothing we can do? Harvelle, we're going to do the best we bloody can if I have anything to say about-"  
"No, Sheriff, we're not and we can't. Anna Shirley is thirty two years old, so as far as we, the Mayor and the rest of the town is concerned, until three days of absolutely no contact, Anna Shirley is not missing, she's vacationing. And really, we can do absolutely nothing about it."  
Mayor Chuck Shirley looked up at Jo's stiff, rigid form with a level glare and said, "Well, mind you Detective, she may be thirty two but she's practically fifteen."

Dean Winchester was furious. He was almost never furious- save that time when Sam had taken it upon himself to date the most irritating mess of a girl who nearly dragged him into things the devil would frown upon. His knuckles clenched around the edge of his desk, the tips turning white and the skin around where his finger nails bit into bloomed red. His legs felt heavy in his boots, his breath felt hot and wrong and his mind started to drift everywhere- the edge of the smudged window, the messy blanket strewn across the couch, the coffee rings left on the table top by countless mugs.  
"Thirty two?" He shook his head, attempting to collect his frantic, erratic thoughts as he asked the petite blonde who stood leaning on the side of his desk.  
The desk was a deep brown maybe it's oak masterpiece that had been in this room for centuries. This room being the Sheriff's office, which was just a fancy way of saying the place Dean chose to brood over life with a cup of cheap coffee and regret.  
"You know, the answer hasn't changed since the last time you asked me that."  
Dean stared back at her.  
She sighed, "Yes Dean, thirty two. She graduated in your year I think, how can you not remember her."  
"Seriously Jo? Do you remember any on you graduated with?"  
"Well, No. But she's one of those unforgettable ones. With the doe eyes and whatnot."  
"Doe Eyes? Memorable? For Christ's sake, Garth has doe eyes."  
"Yeah, and I actually remember graduating with Garth."  
"I think that has a lot more to do with him being your co-worker than with him as a person."  
"Dean, really? The point is that she's thirty two and practically ancient and not young enough to be classified as missing just because she didn't come back home by curfew."  
Dean snorted, "I'm not saying she is. I'm saying this is our first real case, the least we can do is research a bit, look around-"  
"This is no case, Winchester. She's probably holed up in Motel 17 with a hook up or a lover and cheap booze, or taking an overdue roadtrip-"  
"Alone?"  
"Yes well some of us like being by ourselves, Winchester. Not all of us crave social acceptance at every second of every day."  
"The hell I do!"  
Jo chuckled, adjusting her gun holster, and let her eyes wander around the room once more, trying to spot anything she had not seen before just to pass the time.  
The phone on the desk shook violently as it rang- a cry that broke the silence that had awkwardly settled into the room. Dean snatched it up, silently hoping whoever was on the other line was calling to inform him that this was all a hoax and Anna Shirley actually 16.  
"Sheriff Winchester," he growled out, attempting to cover up is furiously pissed mood with masculine bravado.  
"Sheriff?" Becky's tinny voice drifted through the phone, "The Shiurley's are here to see you."  
"Is this about Anna Shirley?"  
"Yep. Anna Shirley, still thirty two and still on vacation."  
Dean nodded, growled out a, "I'll be there Becky," with more force than necessary before slamming the phone down.  
"I take it the Mayor is here?" Jo snickered.  
"Harvelle, can it. Find Hanscum and go buy me a bagel."  
Jo shrugged noncommittally, "Well, that's as good action as we're going to get."  
Dean marched out of his office, with sheer determination. If there was going to be no case, then he was going to go home and drown in low budget, homeless sitcom shows and cereal and to do that he needed the Mayor to can the case. In the middle of the waiting room, the Mayor stood looking completely and utterly out of place amount the grit and brawl men and woman that sat in their little cubicle pretending to do paperwork they didn't have. Beside him, a thin woman in a pale dress and heels too tall to be considered practical attire stood flanked by the equally enthralled and confused litany of journalists ranging from the Folks Post to little independent school papers. Dean sighed. A scene.  
"Mayor."  
"I don't like this. I don't like that you bunch of lazy oafs are sitting around here at your ratty little desks doing absolutely nothing while my-our little baby girl is out there cold and alone and probably dying. She could be dying Chuck, and this poor excuse of a Police Station is doing Jack shit about it."  
Dean stared down as a thin, pale faced little woman stood stoically behind the hunched Mayor, glaring down at Carlos, Lisbon and the rest of the desk crew who sat shaking under her gaze, desperately willing the ground to swallow them whole. He didn't blame them. The glare this woman was distributing to the members of the station put Meryl Streep to shame. She stood there, like God had graced her with something unfathomable to the rest of them, with her back straighter than a stripper’s pole and her chin held so high she could probably see over all their heads. Her nose twitched at the sight of him-barely together, with a coffee in his hand and a half eaten granola bar in the other- and made a haughty noise of disgust.  
"Sheriff," she said, and with the drawl she dragged and bored look in her eyes she might as well have been saying, “Housekeeper.”  
“Mrs Shirley, I wish we had met again under better circumstances.”  
"Why? Why is this not a pleasant circumstance? You clearly take this whole situation to be nothing but a joke so pardon me if I fail to see your concern."  
Dean sighed, "I do have my concerns regarding your daughter's whereabouts, however, it is not in my mandate to do anything about it. She's an adult."  
"She lives with her parents, Sherriff. Surely, you don't actually consider her a fully functioning adult," Mrs Shirley sneered, placing a dainty hand atop her husband's shoulder.  
Chuck Shirley lifted his chin up a fraction at the contact, then made no move at all.  
"Anna Shirley is thirty two. I have no right-"  
"You do now. Chuck, darling, tell this man what he is about to do."  
The Mayor cleared his throat, glanced up to look at all the inquisitive figures that loomed over him then quickly averted his eyes to the floor.  
"Mr Winchester," he began, "Finding my daughter is now your top priority case. Until she is found, any other case can be considered on hiatus. Finding Anna Shirley will be everyone's priority from here and on."  
The silence that followed was brief and short-lived, then mourned. And Dean Winchester knew when there was a fight he couldn't fight, and if the sounds of cameras snapping and pen scratching paper were any indication, this fight was out of his league. The journalists huddled over their notepads, eating up the littlest smidge of drama and chaos, cataloguing every different emotion that flickered over Carlos', Lisbon's and the rest of the crew's face as they went through the five stages of utter shock collectively. The station was half panic, half rendered to silence and Dean was in between himself, trying to flip through each emotion as fast as he could while trying to process the information laid before him. Once he had fathomed enough to construct a proper sentence he choked out,  
"There's not a single thing I can do or say to change your mind, is there?"  
Mrs Shirley glanced at him patronizingly and said, "If it's of any consolation, there never was."  
She paused and did a sweep of the room again, assessing it with caution and the same amount of disgust she had when she saw it first.  
"I think," she said, doing what looks like her utmost to refrain from wincing, "this is the point at which you interrogate us."  
"Have you done anything wrong?" Dean coughed out, "I think I'll take you two in for questioning, and then decided whether or not I have to rule you down as suspects and then, we can get to the interrogating."  
Mrs Shirley regarded him with disinterest, looking as much as the unimpressed quiche eating supremacist Dean had pictured her to be. As though the use of Police-Terminology had cut through an invisible layer of shock, the Table Crew spun into action- bodily shoving the group of journalists out the door till there was only Mayor and Mrs Shirley left and a small hunched figure seated on the waiting room chairs.  
"Son," Chuck addressed the figure, "Come on. To the Sheriffs room."  
"Uh- He can stay here, and Mrs Shirley, you will go with Detective Lisbon over there," Dean said with a jerky gesture towards Detective Lisbon, "I'll take you, Mr Mayor. Your son can come after."  
Soundlessly, Chuck Shirley followed the broad brick of a man, into the Sheriff's office, internally panicking for his wife had failed to inform the rest of them as to whether or not this was also the point in time in which they were taken for head shots and really, he was really not ready for that.

Donna Hanscum was tired. She was tired and on the verge of a drastically terrible headache, if she was being completely honest and also irritated. Her usually chirpy mood had been rained down on the moment Becky Rosen had called saying, "There's a case that’s not a case but it’s going to be a scene and you're needed," or something to that extent. Since its Becky, there were probably a few oh my gods and you wouldn't believes in there as well. Either way, what had promised to be a good morning was turning out to be one of the worst. She's woken up at 4:00, reluctantly and grumbling while she did but she did it, and done the mandatory six stretches for everyone her age who gave the tiniest flying fuck about their health, and then indulged in tea and doughnuts, hoping the day was going to be filled with Cats stuck in trees that the fire department couldn't afford to save and girl scouts on cookie selling duty. Instead, what she got was a handful of almost but quite a case. Well, she thought absentmindedly to herself, at least I don’t have to deal with Mrs Pepper today. The small victories in life are what keep us going.  
The door swung open to reveal the Sheriff with a rather depressed looking Mayor in tow. Donna quickly tossed the cream cheese bagel on to the table in the most discreet way she could muster and pulled her notebook from her pocket. The Sheriff acknowledged her presence with a stiff nod and Mayor, who for a second looked like he was about to do the same but then quickly changed his mind, settled for a barely audible pleasantry.  
"Please, sir down Mayor."  
"Call me Chuck, Sheriff, I insist," The Mayor- Chuck- replied in a shaky voice.  
The Sheriff nodded solemnly before replying, "Then please call me Dean."  
Chuck nodded in an agreement and plopped down onto the chairs place in front of the Sheriff's table.  
"Don’t mind Detective Hanscum," Dean smiled lightly, "She's just here to take notes so we can refer them later."  
If she hadn't been working with Dean for over ten years, she’d say he was nonchalant about this whole ordeal. But Donna knew him like she knew her kitchen cupboard, so to say- pretty fucking well. And right now, Dean Winchester was anything but nonchalant. He was irritated, he was annoyed and he was ready to beat the living daylights of the next poor soul that dared to get in his way. But Dean was Dean, and the only reaction you could get out of him was an easy going smile. Dean Winchester never liked to satisfy anyone with the reaction they wanted.  
Donna glanced at the back of Chuck's head, idly wondering what kind of reaction he was expecting from the Sheriff and whether or not he was receiving it. You could never tell with these rich folks.  
"Alright Chuck, you say she 'stormed out', is that correct?"  
"In a flurry. Yes."  
"And why exactly did Anna, storm out?"  
"Well Sheriff-uh, Dean, I don't know. Everything was fine. It was a normal enough Monday. A bit tiresome for all of us, Monday's take a toll-"  
"Let's keep on track, shall we, Chuck?" Dean smiled, "Was anything troubling Anna?"  
"No. Not that I'm aware of, no."  
"Hmm, Does Anna have any lovers?"  
"What? No! What are you insinuating Sheriff?" Chuck's face paled at the question.  
"I'm trying to ask you if your thirty two year old daughter might just be at a lover's house or well, holed up in Motel 17. It's a possibility. We look at possibilities. All of them."  
"No. No, Anna is not with a lover. She is not like that."  
"She's Thirty two."  
"What does her age have to do with this? You are thirty two, and you're mighty single yourself, Sherriff," Chuck coughed out, eyes darting around the room as he squirmed in his chair, "Can we, not talk about my daughter's affairs please?"  
"This whole investigation is about your daughter's affairs, actually."  
"Affairs of such crude nature! I want those left out. Or left for my wife to answer. Or preferably left out. Definitely left out."  
Dean sighed, "We are trying to locate her-"  
"No locate her, find her. She's not just hanging out somewhere. She's missing. Anna-it's not like Anna to just go away and not come back. I know my daughter, she's-she's in trouble and you need to take this seriously please, and until you can, I'm leaving."  
Seemingly satisfied with the fact that he managed to construct a sentence that made at least a bit of sense, Chuck Shirley lifted himself off the chair and stormed out the door in what was probably a hilarious reinterpretation of his daughter at 6:00 pm yesterday.  
"That's one wound up man," she chuckled.  
Dean grunted in response, head hanging low and shoulders slumped in defeat.  
"Winchester?" She prodded his side.  
"Why don't you join Harvelle, I've just got the kid left. Sure that'll be a breeze."  
"Huh, I'm not too sure about that. I haven’t heard much about the Shirley’s boy, but the bit I have made me come to the conclusion that he's elusive."  
"In a good way or a bad way?"  
Donna shrugged, "You decide Chief. I'm out. Your bagel is near the newspaper."  
"Yeah. I saw you throw it."  
"You saw?"  
"It was hard to miss. I knew you were trying to be discreet too, because you had that look on your face. Gold, pure gold," he said with a chuckle.  
"What face? I mean, what look?" Donna huffed.  
"The Hanscum is trying to be stealthy look. Fucking hilarious."  
"I can't believe you lot. I have no such look."  
"Hanscum, there's a perfectly legitimate reason we only take Harvelle on shakeout. That look is that legitimate reason."  
Donna scowled, "We don't go on stakeouts."

Detective Lisbon wasn't too sure as to whether or not this day was a particularly good day or if it wasn't, but take it in stride is what his pop had told him so take it in stride he would. The day started out as every normal Tuesday did, with normal routine and normal habitual activities, and even the uproar of journalists hand really fazed him. He was from the city, there were plenty of uproar there, so he'd become somewhat immune to sudden outbursts of drama. However, the day took its turn when Detective Hanscum shuffled into the filing room and informed him, or rather the entire desk crew, that someone had to find the Mayor's son pronto or Winchester would blow a fuse. So Lisbon had done what any other logically thinking man who didn't want Winchester to blow his finally fuse -so basically every logically thinking man ever- and hightailed out of the filing room in pursuit of a lanky teenager. Finding the kid hadn't been hard, Lisbon had somehow managed to loose himself in the precinct- which he assumed the kid had managed to do as well- and stumbled upon the Mayor's son halfway in halfway out of a holding cell. The hard part had been convincing the kid to leave the holding cell, for apparently the kid wanted to stay.  
"What's the Sheriff got to do with me anyway? Ask me a bunch of stupid questions, treat me like some kid and then let me go because there's nothing else he can do because there's nothing to do because their nothing there."  
All in all, it was a pleasantly worded monologue and Lisbon internally applauded the kid, before telling him that he'd have to call the kid's mother if the kid refused to leave again. To this the kid replied,  
"You suck," which Lisbon didn't think was as eloquent as his previous monologue but sufficed.  
"Kid's here," Lisbon announced as he directed the aforementioned kid into the Sheriff's office and then hightailed out.  
Never let it be said that Lisbon was a coward. Sure, Lisbon was a little scared was Winchester, but so was every logically thinking man. These sort of assurance were the kind of things Lisbon liked to think set him apart from Cowards.

 

"I'm Castiel."  
From the time it took for Dean to lift his head up from where it was nestled in his arms, a lanky 18 or so old kid had placed himself in the chair in front of his desk, clothed in a ridiculous amount of layers and this coming from Dean means something. He wore what could be a suit, but was covered by a tan trench coat that had clearly seen better days, and Dean would have laughed because an 18 or so year old in a trench coat is a peculiar sight but spring down here is cold as fuck so really, the kid was just wearing sensible attire. He didn't appear to take after his mother.  
"What?"  
"My name. It's Castiel. Castiel Shirley. I know you don't know cause no one knows."  
"Well, in that case, I'm Dean-"  
"Winchester. Dean Winchester. I know. Hello Dean."  
"You don't mind me asking how you happen to know my name, do you?"  
"Your name seems to be thrown around a lot in my house in these past few hours. Or rather, the title and name Sheriff Winchester has been thrown around. You supplied your first name, I filled in what I knew. Assuming you're the Sheriff, I'm right. And judging by your badge, I am right."  
"Oh."  
In all honesty, the question had been a throw away joke, a sort of one liner meant to ease the tension. But at least now all doubt about whether or not this was the Mayor's son were gone, for this Castiel Shirley was, if not elusive, strange.  
“Also, you have a plaque on your table and a sign on your door. I’d have to be blind to miss your name, and that I am not,” he concluded, then added with an afterthought, “Sir.”  
"Alright Castiel. Your father informs me that your sister, Anna, stormed out last night. Do You know why?"  
"No."  
"Okay then, Castiel. Are you close to Anna?"  
"No."  
"Do you know where Anna is?"  
"No."  
"Do you know where she might be?"  
"No."  
"Jesus, do you even know her?"  
The kid paused, titled his head and donned a frown, almost as if he were considering this as an actual question that required an answer. After a moment's beat, Dean realized that the kid was in fact trying to conjure up a suitable answer.  
"You don't have to answer-"  
"No."  
A pause. A pregnant pause landed heavily in the room and rested on Dean's shoulders.  
"She's your sister."  
"Yes."  
Dean realized with dismay that the kid either talked a lot or talked the bare minimum and rarely ever in between. Elusive seemed fitting.  
"How do you not know your own sister?"  
Castiel shifted in the chair, "It's really not that had to believe seeing that she's a grand total of twelve years senior to me. I barely see her around the house, as it is a rather large house and my family does not partake in family dinners unless it’s Christmas time. There's only a very little you can learn about a person during Christmas, Mr Winchester, so to conclude, as I have only Christmas with my sister to get to know her, I only know a very little of my sister."  
"Of your sister?"  
"Oh, I know absolutely nothing about her."  
"You really don't use the English language loosely do you?"  
"I was not brought up that way," Castiel said as though everyone should know this fact about him, even if they didn't know his name.  
"Alright I'll bite. You don't know Anna at all, you don't look shaken by the fact that she's gone and you don't look the least bit guilty. Where do you think she is?"  
"I don't know."  
Dean deftly raised an expert eyebrow. Castiel relented.  
"Probably somewhere off the North of Los Angles."  
"Los Angles?"  
"Yes, Los Angles. The city of Angels. The city of-"  
"I know where Los Angles is, I want to know why she's there of all places."  
"Anna has always wanted to go to Los- No that's a blatant lie. Anna is there because it is familiar. Anna isn't someone who would runaway to somewhere unknown. I assume."  
"Runaway?"  
"Yes. The act of-"  
"Anna ran away?"  
"I think."  
"What?"  
"Previously, you asked me where I think she is. I think she might be in LA because I think- No I'm almost certain- she ran away."  
"Did you tell your parents? If she's in LA why aren't your parents all up in LA-"  
"Tell my parents? For what joy? They won't do a thing."  
"You don't know that."  
"Actually, Mr Winchester, I do. Gabriel ran away to Los Angles and my parents didn't budge. Well, they did budge. They budge enough to pack up our belonging and move across the country-not to L.A., but to this little dent on the off side of the interstate. Gabriel was old news. In a few weeks, Anna will be old news and as far as this town is concerned, so will the Shirleys. We'll move again, out of Willow Valley, and never be spoken of again. You asked me where I think she is, and I've answered so now may I leave?"  
The boy didn't wait for Dean's permission, merely strode across the room in a flurry of trench coat and all Dean could do was sit and attempt to wrap his mind around the fact that Anna Shirley had run away, Chuck Shirley probably had another son, Chuck Shirley’s kids were probably up in LA and Castiel Shirley just called Dean's hometown and the town where he was born and raised a 'little dent on the off side of the interstate' and really, Dean couldn't find it in himself to disagree.

 

Just as the afternoon glow had settled over the pavements and rooftops on Willow Valley, Castiel stumbled in a blur of pale limbs into his best friends room, propped himself up on one elbow and declared,  
“I told the Sherriff my sister ran away but I really really really don’t think she did.”  
“What? Why not?”  
“Because I found a note by her to me.”  
“What does it say, you idiot?”  
“Well, it’s sort of over the top and really superstitious- or maybe not superstitious, maybe more paranoid, for her to write it and for me to believe it because-,”  
“Castiel Shirley, just shut the fuck up and tell me what it says.”  
A heartbeat.  
“ _Run_.”

* * *

 

_On a particularly idle Tuesday morning in the middle of spring, in the tiny, quiet and little dent of a town on the off side of the interstate peculiarly named Willow Valley for reasons still unknown, a little bubble of chaos rose from the thicket. And it grew. And grew. And grew._

**Author's Note:**

> So hi, this is my first book and honestly this feels like a teaser chapter than a real chapter. Warnings for: violence, swearing and nothing you aren't used to if you watch supernatural i guess also jesus christ it's so hard to write up Dean.  
> Errors are all mine.  
> I do not own any of these characters except for Detective Lisbon that baby is all mine. Heh. All credit to Kripke and crew.  
> Comment fuel existence.


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